I’m wondering if this pandemic didn’t scar and scare us a little too much where we’ve been retreating, perhaps hiding within ourselves.
There’s been a shift. A dramatic repositioning of our energy. I’m not sure if it was there prior, and yet I would have detected it sooner. Awareness is an interesting tool. By feeling angst and displaced comes an awakening of sorts. That is if we’re open to it.
This awakening can be used to replenish, re-energize, and perhaps comfort the things we’re most uncomfortable with. It can also be used to push ourselves back into slumber where we decide not to try. The choice is ours.
Choosing can be tricky. Choosing requires us to be in a certain mindset where, if we’re feeling defeated can either spiral us further down the rabbit hole, or to be cliché, have us reach for the light at the end of the tunnel. If we chose the latter, no matter what our frame of mind, in most if not all situations we would come out rising above and thriving forward.
So, how does this transpire for us? Small steps. Human steps.
Show me a human and I’ll show you someone no matter how reclusive, that still needs relationships of some kind. Human connection. Human kindness, compassion, and empathy. I’m not saying all humans can and will reciprocate. I’m saying, we as humans, need connection.
Stating the obvious doesn’t feel so obvious.
It’s the simple things that require our attention. These simple things will eventually resonate with our being. Our soul, and energy. The basic niceties of life that currently seem elusive.
The simple act of connecting with our eyes. Looking our fellow humans in the eyes to acknowledge that the other exists. That they are with us in that moment. Powerful.
It takes a second. A warm, beautiful, caring second. It’s clearly not easy for most to do this, or else it would happen more freely. Understanding that we have a lot going on in our lives, trying to connect with our fellow humans while walking in the streets, standing in lines, pausing to look around so not to slam doors behind us isn’t as easy as one might think. This all takes awareness, and the desire to want to connect with others.
Knowing one’s name. Connecting with another by saying their name. A superpower. One we tend to forget, and often. The simple act of using a person’s name when emailing, texting, reaching out in some way. Say a name, in many cases, not all, may more willingly respond to us. Send a message without using one’s name – why bother. No response because we don’t know who you’re talking about. It feels like, ‘hey you.’
Excuse Me. Please. Pardon Me. Thank you. Words that have disappeared from the English language. I’m hoping this isn’t universal. I miss these words.
Rather, we look disgusted, frustrated, ‘get out of my way’ angry. ‘Can’t you see it’s all about me’ ME. Not you, us, we. But ME. ‘Go away and stop bothering me.’ And ‘Absolutely do not breathe on me.’ ‘In fact, could you walk on the other side of the street?’
The power of kindness. The strength of compassion and empathy. The pause of being in the moment, have ALL become unique skills that have us, those that choose to embrace them, an opportunity to rise above it all. To shine. Sparkle even.
I still believe in people. Our Human race. Happily, there are so many that have mastered these powers, and, in my mind, it seems to make up for all those who decided to abandon the way of connecting. This justification helps me sleep at night. It puts my heart at ease.
Imagine if more of us chose to open up, risk being vulnerable, and let our kind soul lead the way.
Imagine if we dusted off the anxiety, panic, anger, frustration, and the feeling that we’re all going mad in a world that we’re finding very difficult to understand. No rational thinking can help us heal.
And yet,
we lead with kindness anyway. With optimism. We try.
We take charge of how we want to be present in our lives. We get personal. Very personal. We express through kindness that others exist. We look around. We find the moments we’re in and embrace them. We smile. We acknowledge. We use words that matter most. We raise the vibration with those words and with our understanding that ‘we’ walk this earth, because ‘I’ is an awfully lonely place to stand.
‘We’ can come easily to those that try.
We need to try much harder.